Spraying Neutered Tom

fourcats

Can anyone help. I have just got home from work to find my house stinking again. I have a neutered six year old tom who started spraying a couple of years ago when a stray got in. He has since continued spraying just for the hell of it and particularly when he gets carried away playing with the dog. I have come to the end of the road, having tried plug in things which cost a fortune, washing everywhere every day, buying a special light which is supposed to show up pee thus hitting the spot easier which sort of helps a bit, even getting him hormones. Please someone help

gigawatt

hi,i really feel for you as that stinks and is so hard to get rid of! i know that for cleaning up spray supposedly the best thing is biological washing powder as the enzymes in it break down fatty molecules in the spray and kill the stink completely. as for why hes doing it, im not sure, maybe talk to your vet, is it possible his castration was incomplete? if i was you I would resign him to being an outdoor cat until its sorted. thats unbearable!! tbh if he cant respect the no spraying in the house rule he doesnt deserve to be in the house!!

mymo

A friend of mine had a tom start this some years after neutering, he had been done before she got him.
The vet said sometimes one of the testicles is not fully developed/descended or something, and can drop or develop at a later date. He had done some hormone test for an imbalance, and a blood test and suggested quick op to neuter him again.
It worked and the spraying stopped.
I would consult your vet, from what she said there are many reasons this could be happening.

fourcats

Thanks for that but I had all that done at the begining and all his bits are gone. We had a trial of giving him female hormones to try and damp down the macho thing but again to no avail. As I said this really is the end of the road for him and I'm guessing he'd be worse if he was rehomed. I'm off now in the dark with my ultra violet light to try and locate the small drops which is all he does and comfort myself with the thought that it would be a worse stink if he wasn't deutered!

fourcats

You are right about keeping him out, but he won't know why of course. A solution of peroxide and baking powder is good for lessening the smell once you can find the place to clean,my house has never been so clean and tidy as well as being washed constantly I cant leave anything down as everything new gets sprayed! Thanks for your sympathetic reply.

The Sweeper

OKay fourcats.

So you've tried vetwork, hormone injections, cleaning the areas thoroughly to the point you even use a blacklight to show up the protein in the pee spots to ensure you clean everything. By the sound of it you've also tried feliway diffusers (the plug in things).

Can you list the other things you've tried?

I'd be right back to basics with this guy. Spraying is one of the top reasons for cats being abandoned to a shelter, and it sounds like you're really at the end of your tether so it's either fix it, or you feel you're going to have to give him up or put him to sleep.

Do you have either the facility to enclose him in one single room for up to five or six weeks, or do you have the facility to build him an outdoor enclosure so you restrict his access to the house when you're not home?

This is deeply ingrained behaviour, and a total behavioural change requires a totally consistent overhaul that will need to continue for at least four weeks. This overhaul will involve restricting him to a single room, containing nothing of value to you, and litter boxes that are kept scrupulously clean. The cat needs to lose his attachment to the rest of the house as his territory for starters, so he stops feeling the need to pee all over it and everything in it.

He needs litter box retraining, only to make him associate peeing with the litter box and with nothing else (not because this is a litter problem in the first place - this is an emotional, behavioural problem).

He needs to be calmed down somewhat - hormone injections haven't worked, but other things might. See if you can buy an approved valerian based product - valerian is similar to catnip, but it has a calming effect. The pure essential oil is far too strong for use with or around the cat, so you'd be better off getting a ready-diluted pet spray for use with cats.

Bachs flower remedies do a rescue remedy for cats - you can put a few drops in their water and rub a drop or two into the back of each ear. I've never had to use it with my cats, but some of the Australian breeders I know swear by it.

However, I believe no amount of potions, lotions, injections or sprays are going to make a difference until your cat breaks the association of your house being his house to do with as he pleases. To achieve that, you're going to have to restrict his access, but it has to be a restriction that has pleasant associations (a new scratching post, maybe? new toys? nice food? valerian and rescue remedy, all used in conjunction?) so he doesn't come out of his temporary imprisonment frantic to get his own territory back and pissing everywhere like a firehose.

On that note, seeing as you say you have a dog, perhaps it's important to your cat that he has a space that is exclusively his own territory, into which the dog and new things are never brought. If you have the space to restrict him, can you turn that restricted area into his 'cave'? This should be somewhere he has a bed, food bowls that the dog can't steal from, his own water and toys, and that space should remain constant, not be somewhere he's moved out of.

Whatever happens, do give him a chance at rehoming rather than putting him to sleep (this isn't a judgment - you may have never intended on having him PTS, but I understand that a lot of people end up a weeping wreck, living in a house that constantly smells of cat pee). It may be that he would calm down in an environment that you simply cannot provide - e.g. a quiet house, with older people and no other pets, where other cats don't visit the garden outside and all external stressors are removed. It's a long shot for him to be rehomed with a history of spraying, but you never know.

fourcats

Many thanks for your comprehensive advice which I will study later today. It was hormone tablets he was given (Oestriol 1mg daily). Do you think injection would have been more effective? Do you think he would continue to spray if I moved him into my son's house?
Again, many thanks.

The Sweeper

Tablets/injections - you'd have to ask your vet how they feel about the potential efficacy of each variety. I know my local shelter owner always opts for injections (jabs over tabs!) on hormone injections for spraying problems.

Moving him into your sons house - that depends on WHY he sprays at your house. If he sprays because he feels uncertain and territorially challenged (highly likely), he may get worse at your son's house, unless your son has the facility to enclose him somewhere, or has a quiet house with no other pets. Also, moving him to your son's and then back to your place over a short period could make him worse if his spraying is a manifestation of his anxiety about territory.